“To secure for workers by hand or by brain, the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution and exchange, and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service.”

So read clause 4 of the Labour party’s constitution. I say ‘read’ in the past tense because it no longer exists. One of the first things to fall under Tony Blair’s New Labour. He had it struck out altogether before he even became Prime Minister. I wonder what we were all doing at the time.

The present Labour Party are flailing about trying to discover what went wrong in the election or/and which new leader to elect that will bring voters back to the fold.

After the 1914-18 war many of the men who had gone through hell but survived, came home to discover the jobs that existed for them were so lowly paid they could barely survive, while profits for the company owners rocketed. They sacrificed so much apparently only to be forgotten. The Labour movement grew out of the injustice.

Almost a century later injustice does in fact still flourish, 6% of the population have as much wealth as 20 million of the people in our country. The necessity for food banks grows, the bankers continue to get away with murder, having created financial mayhem for everyone but themselves and the ultra wealthy. While in parliament the lobbyists continue to dictate much of what goes on.

The present labour party still seem to be chasing Tony Blair’s idea of socialism, which is no idea at all. Who needs a slightly altered Tory Party?

Years of extreme Tory behaviour under Thatcher, (industries destroyed, social housing sold off, privatization of rail, energy, water etc.)
That her reign only followed by one of her pupils, Tony Blair; feathering his own nest while pretending socialism. Apart from his personnel wealth Mr. Blair’s legacy was the Iraq war, which inflamed radicalization and gave extremists EXACTLY what they wanted. (Before his sudden and unexpected death, Dr. Kelly knew this.)

More recently we have the experience of Mr. Cameron who when asked why he wanted to be Prime Minister replied “Because I think I’d be rather good at it.”
Under his first innings we lost The Royal Mail, but hey! we got to pay more VAT, and began the bedroom tax. To make sure there was more pressure on the NHS (which “will be safe in my hands”) social benefits were radically reduced, and privatization of our precious health service (begun, yes, under labour) blossomed like a poisonous flower.

So the swell in numbers of S.N.P. voters is totally understanable. Anything to get away from ‘that shower at Westminster’.
However we are all citizens of the world.
And Nationalism sets up hatred of the other.
The “people of Scotland” are no more important than any other person in Britain.
We all have to fight retrogressive policies. We all have to fight hypocrisy, greed and narrow mindedness. Together.

The ‘Lion of Scotland’; must’ve missed him on the motorway. It is little wonder the SNP vote surged without the heavy handed help of Alex Salmond. After a devastating night for Ed Milliband and Labour all Mr. Salmond could do was castigate Milliband for not winning more labour seats in England. Milliband had just resigned leadership of his party after what must’ve been a grueling time. Congratulations Mr Salmond for showing such empathy for Ed ( at the same time blethering about a lion of Scotland roaring through the country. Hmm. ) Hypocritical at very best; the SNP set up Mr Milliband TO fail. Nicola: ” I’d like to say now Ed that we would be willing to work with a Labour government” – this reiterated over and over on television, in the press, at every opportunity. OF COURSE this very public invitation is seized on by Cameron. He (C), repeatedly reminded voters that the SNP would be the tail wagging the labour dog in power. Salmond and clever Nicola set up Ed Milliband for the fall. Then they blame him for actually falling. For those who remember, it was the SNP who helped Thatcher to hang onto power. It is in Nicola and Salmond’s interests to have Tories in Westminster. Eventually they will be able to turn to their followers and say “Look, we can’t work with these Tories, they want to take us out of Europe, and all the rest. We will simply HAVE to hold another referendum although we said we wouldn’t”. Save us from these power hungry hypocritical politicians.

Mr Bumble could not resist rustling and shaking his newspaper which always encouraged the cat to attack it, which she did. On this occasion she went berserk and ate the thing so that a hole emerged from page one to page twenty seven or whatever the last page was. In any case Mr. Bumbles’ newspaper was now a large hole surrounded by a few rumpled, crumpled words.

“I don’t know what we can do to change the world. I just don’t know,” Mr Bumble said with a sigh.

“I don’t really see how we can.” Mrs. Bumble agreed, then suggested breakfast.

Downstairs Mr. Bumble went out to visit the oddly shaped summerhouse. The night before a bee had become entangled with Mrs. Bumble’s long housecoat thing, and as it was raining at the time, Mr. Bumble didn’t want to put the bee outside in the wet. So he’d put the housecoat, with bee, in the summerhouse and left the door ajar for it to get out if and when the rain stopped. This morning there was no sign of it so things must’ve worked out for the bee.

Breakfast outside emphasized the prolonged good weather everyone was enjoying; the sky was brilliant blue and a gentle balmy breeze kept the heat of the sun comfortable. Mr. Bumble had a lot of work to complete in his garden along the road; knocking down an enormous log box, and turning it into a less intrusive log store. As for Mrs Bumble, she was determined not to put off planting out the sweet peas. Yes, of course this should have been completed weeks ago. Yes, of course the sweet peas had developed roots that had tangled and hardened ALMOST beyond help. However she was determined to get the struggling plants out of their pots, into some decent earth and onto some climbing frame. The whole operation proved far more difficult and time consuming than she would’ve imagined. As she worked, it occurred to Mrs Bumble, not for the first time, the similarity that existed between gardening and life in general. When you don’t tackle things at the right time, when you sweep tasks under the carpet, they often end up being so much more complicated to deal with at the later date. But she persevered vowing that with regard to sweet peas at any rate, she’d learnt her lesson.

Mr. Bumble arrived to fill in the area outside the shed. He’d begun reconstructing the approach to the door, involving removal of earth, building a wooden construction and goodness knows what else. Now he began replacing the earth, topping it with sand grit and gravel and completely transforming what had been an awkward entrance. As he worked Mrs. Bumble tackled the mess in the wood shed. All in all a lot of transformation was taking place. In fact Mrs. Bumble meant to say to Mr. Bumble that the world had been changed after all, even if only a little. But in the flurry of putting together something to eat she forgot to mention it.

They were just able to see the last minutes of the world cup final. They thought it was going to be fifteen minutes but in fact they got to watch forty five minutes due to extra play time. Mr. Bumble was particularly pleased at the outcome and so was Mrs. Bumble. Another change for the world then; Germany had won the world cup and Mr. and Mrs Bumble from the UK were extremely pleased about it.